Created 10-Jan-23
Modified 13-Dec-23
from floridatoday.com...
Cape Canaveral Space Force Station hosted a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch and booster landing for the second time in under a week on Monday night. At 11:50 p.m. ET, a Falcon 9 vaulted from Pad 40 carrying 40 satellites to orbit for OneWeb, a competitor to SpaceX in the satellite internet industry.
A little over eight minutes after liftoff, the Falcon 9 first-stage booster returned to the Cape’s Landing Zone 1 for a landing that generated window-rattling sonic booms over Central Florida for a second time this month. The spacecraft, meanwhile, continued on a southerly trajectory skirting the coast of Florida.
OneWeb says its network, to be comprised of about 600 satellites, is aimed more toward heavy users like telecom providers, aviation and maritime industries, and governments. SpaceX’s Starlink network stands at roughly 3,500 deployed satellites and is intended for broad usage ranging from residential to aircraft and recreational vehicles to military purposes.
Monday’s mission was only the second for OneWeb to be launched by SpaceX. Previous OneWeb missions were launched on Russian Soyuz rockets, but OneWeb cut its ties with Russia’s space agency in March last year after Russia invaded Ukraine. To date, OneWeb has launched about 500 internet-beaming satellites built at the company’s nearby factory on Merritt Island, Florida.
According to a OneWeb release, the mission marked OneWeb’s 16th overall launch and keeps "the company on track to deliver global coverage in 2023." According to a post made on the company’s Twitter account, OneWeb has three more missions planned for the early months of the year.
© Dennis Huff
